Pro cycling has an unfortunate association with crashes. High speeds, a big peloton, and very driven athletes taking every chance to win does result in some riders exceeding the limits of grip and space available, resulting in crashes. There, of course, have also been concerns about course design and safety, with riders and rider unions calling out what they deem to be unsafe racing conditions that have led to crashes. It’s not just in the races as well, but out in training, sometimes crashes happen and can have serious ramifications.
But how do riders recover from these, sometimes very serious, crashes? We’ve seen incredible cases of riders winning races just days after fracturing an elbow, completing a Grand Tour with a fractured back, and riders returning from crashes most medical professionals would deem as career-ending, in less than a year.
The damage that these crashes can do
Injuries in sports are certainly not uncommon. We see in football various ligament injuries or muscle strains that can take athletes out for weeks, while tennis star Andy Murray was plagued by injuries and hip problems in the latter stages of his career. High-impact sports like rugby have become almost synonymous with concussion incidences, while track and field athletes are commonly plagued with tendon, ligament, and muscle issues. However, there are not many sports, outside of those deemed on the more extreme end of the spectrum, where there is quite such a common occurrence of broken bones as road cycling. More than 150 riders jam-packed on roads, sometimes one lane wide, racing at average speeds of 40-45kph and exceeding more than 80kph on descents, all jostling and fighting for position to continually move up.
The only protection they are afforded, some wafer-thin Lycra that covers half their body and a helmet on top of their head. An inevitable result of this is that almost every single race features a crash, and in those crashes, it is not uncommon to see a high incidence of broken bones along with bruises, cuts, road rash, and concussions. In the most serious of cases, riders can suffer truly horrific and traumatic injuries, known as Polytraumas, which not only put their careers at risk, but also their lives.
Recently, a new scientific research paper looking into polytrauma in professional cycling was published, assessing the impacts of these significant injuries on riders both in the short and long term. Though the cyclist in question is not specifically named,…
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